57 comments:

“Ahh crap, I hate that fuckin sound.” Vinnie muttered as he ducked into the Pawn shops dark entryway. He squinted at the angled storefront’s reflection and confirmed his hunch. Behind him a beat up old Caddy drove by, with its trademark whine from the broken power steering. “Ha, Petrov’s sending Ratchet and Clank in their rusty chicken coop-de-ville. Said two weeks…. I’ll pay him back in full alright.” He walked into the pawn shop with his last twenty.“Got any hammers?” Vinnie asked.“Couple ball peens.” “Nah’ framing hammer, straight claw.”“Got one… kinda rusty.”“Even better…. I’ll take it.”

Blood can rot.I mean, I knew that flesh rotted, but I had no idea that blood could rot as well.Rotten blood smells awful; rancid, and acidic, and coppery.I had to stop having people over, and eventually, my neighbors complained.The first officer vomited when he stepped out of the house into my back yard.By then the coop was empty save for a feather here, a claw there. The foul were gone, but the blood was everywhere.When the metal cuffs ratcheted around my wrists my house was left empty, but my tummy was full.

McDonald sprinted at full speed.His heart raced in his chest as his boots smacked the packed dirt.Sweat soaked through his straw hat.

His pursuer shadowed him.She matched him, step for step. He dared not side glance and give her any advantage.She already had one.

A claw caught him in the back.He screamed.She paralleled his pitch with vibrato.The ratchet chicken had finally flown the coop.The diva and her entourage of back up chicken singers sang out, through beaks stained with red lipstick, “Old McDonald HAD a farm,” in perfect harmony.

Godamn Ratchet. How many times had Coop told him Maisie was off limits. There was no telling a grunt like Ratchet, even if his years as College fullback hadn’t pulverised his brain, he wouldn’t have listened. Maisie, she sure was something. Boss knew it and paid for it, Ratchet knew it and was about to pay for it. Damn. Coop made the call. Ratchet and the Claw were buds back in the day, but Boss called the shots and Claw was a tool. Grubby, relentless, impassive. Coop knocked on Ratchet’s door, took the hood off Claw and walked away.

The position of her fingers told him what he needed to know. Curled, like a claw, scratching in the mud, she was still alive. He strolled back and forth, waiting. He could ratchet things up, move it along, but this was the part he enjoyed, after the dirty work was done. Watching. It gave him a feeling similar to being full after eating, satisfied, content. Coop stood below a tupelo tree, lit a cigarette, listening. The rattling of her breath slowed then stopped. Her fingers relaxed. It was quiet once again in The Great Dismal Swamp.

"Well, that chicken has flown the coop," he chuckles."It's not funny Ramsey," I say through tight lips. I've been backed up on paperwork for a full month. This was the last thing I needed.

Dave Kreighton brutally murdered his before ending his life on his farm. The twisted son-of-a-bitch hung himself with a ratchet strap. I walk back to the decrepit house and toward the basement where the most heinous acts were committed. His wife left claw marks on the door. He saved her for last. Never let people tell you being a detective is a heroic job.

This contest is infuriating. How in the world am I supposed to fit five bizarre words into one story that makes sense? I pound my head against the keyboard and watch the letters form a string of nothingness: “eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee”I take a deep breath and try again.“Ratchet was so angry, he could’ve clawed someone’s eyes out.”Ugh, that wasn’t right either. I deleted the sentence.“Coop was full from Thanksgiving dinner that night.”No, no, no!“I go back to blaaaaaaack.”I delete the document and go to get some ice cream.

Her talons claw at the air, but find no purchase. She must take this punishment. Learn from it. In full view of all others in the coop, bent across my lap. I take a reluctant breath, adjust her feathers, then strike my wing against her backside again. And again. Ratcheting up the pressure with each swat.

She squawks. “But Daddy, I love him!”

Another swat.

The onlooking hens coo, then hush. They understand. Soon she will, too.

“Dad-dy…”

One more spank, then I let her up. “Not another word of this.” No daughter of mine will be dating a fox.

Rachet handed the full bottle to Coop who coughed, took a drink and handed it to Claw. The top of the bottle was now covered in spittle. Claw wiped the rim off with the edge of his shirt before taking a drink.

"You should get that cough checked out," Coop said staring at the red tinged liquid inside the bottle.

“Why? I know what it is. So do you. We’re all infected and it’s only a matter of time before we all turn,” Claw said. “Why do you think they call me Claw? Now give me back that bottle.”

“All I’m asking for is a little cooperation.” Full stare. He never blinks when he speaks. And the rust colored spittle that ever laces his teeth jumps to my face in warm, angry dots. Two heavy, metallic objects clunk onto the tinny tray table beside me. I roll my head to see, squirming as best I can with my hands tied behind my back. He’s placed a claw hammer and a ratchet on the table. I can’t forget what he did with the tweezers yesterday. I tell him again I’m innocent. “Then you wouldn’t be in Gitmo, would you?”

He armed me with a ratchet, but I couldn’t hit the chickens. So I backed away from the hungry swarm of hens that clawed at my legs. They struggled to reach the full bag of feed he dangled over the high, chain-link fence. I couldn’t climb it, but I could throw the ratchet. And boy was he sorry he’d given it to me when I pegged him right between the eyes.

“You have everything needed to breakout, unless I’ve misjudged you,” Cooper said. Dropping the Sig to his side, he kissed Creed full on the mouth. “I loved you more than her, brother.” Cooper pushed a pocket Maglite into Creed’s trembling mouth and backed up, letting the hefty lid secure into place.Creed clawed along the bottom of the aluminum coffin, stretching to his limits. Beyond reach were fisherman’s pliers and a mini-ratchet. The LED streamed across the familiar apartment entry lock refitted to the lid, and he resigned to never escape, though the corresponding key was tucked within his wallet.

“Ratchet! Goll darn it, boy, get back here! Don’t ya go gettin’ yerself near that coop again! Ratchet!”A black and white bullet shot into the chicken house, causing an explosion of squawks and flapping of wings.“That darned dog of yers is gonna get ‘imself killed,” Marla hissed, thrusting the bucket full of brown eggs into her wounded husband’s hands. She held up her apron as she charged toward the coop. Ratchet, clawed and bloody, slowly backed out, dragging something long and heavy.“That Judd’s boot?”Rex nodded at the severed leg.“Gonna need a deeper grave.”

The cat’s claws dug into my back and I leaped off the bed before I woke up good. I whirled and swatted at the cat, yelling for it to get off. Instead of helping, Cooper yanked on the bag full of money looped over my arm, but I hugged my arms together so tight he couldn’t get the bag, not even when that hellcat ratcheted up the pain by clamping his teeth in my shoulder. Me, Cooper and the cat lurched across the room as the cops busted down the door.

The lights rose, no longer blinding me. I could see the full theater, on their feet all the way to the back row.

I took one more polite curtsy in the spotlight before turning away from the adoration.

Was it just a dream?

My keeper’s claw like fingers dug underneath the powder of my shoulders, leading me back to the small coop I called home. I didn’t flinch anymore. He pushed my head down, I hugged my knees. He fastened the ratchet tight.

He immediately set about it, fangs ripping into feathered flesh. She closed the trunk, dropped the ratchet screwdriver onto the passenger seat, slid behind the wheel, and pulled away from the farm whose coop was now minus one resident.

"You okay back there?" she said ten minutes later. Silence. He was probably asleep.

She looked out at the full moon setting on the western horizon and smiled. Just a few more hours and the nightmare will be over. At least for this month.

The monkey was now only half full of stuffing due to the gash that clawed across his belly. Broken records and the once shiny ring, now covered in mud, kept him company in the grass. Footsteps- she was back! Maybe she wouldn’t immediately coop him up in the attic, and he could try to ratchet his way back into her good graces. She threw him again, but this time not at “You cheating bastard!” ’s car. The lid slammed. Now there was another broken heart. But he was the only one abandoned among the coffee grounds and fast food wrappers.

The psych ward was a chicken coop: dirt floor, broken screens and rusty bars on the windows. The nightjars were full. The patients sat on stools, backs slumped, staring. I decided I was somewhere south of Texas, nothing more specific. Just after dawn, a rooster crowed, and in burst Nurse Ratchet. Starched, white uniform, crackling as she walked. No sweat stains. At her nod, the orderlies each took an arm. Legs wouldn’t cooperate. Down the hall we went, my bare feet dragging. In a small, dark room, I smelled the ozone. I clawed against the straps.

"I know he woke you up, but that's what his kind do. Is it really necessary to retaliate?"

I test the blade against the back of my hand. "You'll thank me when our bellies are full tonight."

My husband storms out of the coop, letting the door slam shut. A few hens flutter from their roosts in protest, and the throbbing in my head ratchets up a couple levels. When my enemy comes out to investigate, I grab him by one clawed foot and stare into his beady eyes.

The twins, finally asleep, snore like angels in bed beside her. Their hair, soft as down, glides easily through her fingers. A sudden wind drags through the shutters like a ratchet across a wood floor. Fear closes her eyes like a drug. Livy envisions the old chicken coop; instinctively, she clenches her fists. Her mother used to make Livy feed the chicks until they were full, then claw out their sleepy eyes, and wring their little necks. “I never loved you, Livy,” the memory of her mother whispers. As Livy wakes up screaming, wringing her angel’s limp necks.

I found the claw under six inches of dirt beside a half-dead sagebrush. The sad little thing still had some fur clinging to the back of it. Jolene was digging near the cactus; I slid the claw into my pack. She didn’t need to know yet.

I sat back on my haunches. So, Pratchett lied to me. Mercy knows why I expected any different. Idiot husband.

Jolene gasped. She scooped up another claw, her face white as powdered milk.

“Jo...”

She shook her head sharply, eyes full of rage. “We dig. We find him. Then we chop off his claws.”

I hadn't expected her in this tiny coop. "Did daddy put the princess out with the dogs?"

Celeston sank her claws into my shoulder. Points of pain burned down my arm to the slipjack I'd used on the door.

"I'll shear you myself," she hissed. "Back up." Jewels glittered in Celeston's fully extended crest. My bundled plumes would never get such finery, but they rose half an arm higher. She would gleefully mutilate me to rectify that "genetic mistake."

I rammed my slipjack under her talon, ratcheted it off. She lunged as I ran for the gate.

The full metal jackets tumbled off the dining room table as Fat Boy broke down the door. Too bad my 9mm was in the bedroom. Said the Man wanted to see me. Something about an unfinished job. Payback. Figured I’d be gone awhile so I dumped two scoopfuls in the cat’s dish.

I watch my grandmother from the doorway. She is leaning over the table, her emaciated back crooked, propping up the sweater that hangs from her spine. Claw-like fingers pluck Scrabble tiles from her opponent's wooden tile holder.

Before I flew the coop, I had one last piece of business to finish. I needed to send a message they would never forget. I walked into the back of the bar and saw him sitting there; the smug look on his face doing nothing but help ratchet up my anger another level. I waited until he stood and turned. Before anyone could react to what was happening, I took a full swing with the hammer and slammed the claw into his back. As he turned I smiled and took a slice of his pizza before bolting out the door.

I could bend my knees and kick with my feet to splinter the gnarled wood and crawl out the end.

I could put my hands above my head, arch my back and ratchet up all the strength left inside me to pop the nails out and send the lid flying.

But there is no escape.

For I know full well why I continue to lie here, cooped up for eternity with my hands folded together, fingers intertwined, wishing I could go back to the split second before I ended up in this god-forsaken place.

The crisp, undulations of her sleek form through the water betrayed the message her conservative choice of swimsuit sought to deliver. Annoyed at the ratcheting desire clawing at him, he tossed back his full, sweating glass of Jim Beam.

“If you keep staring at me like that I’m going to cut your eyes out while you sleep,” she said, pulling herself out of the water.

As the bourbon’s burn washed over him, he realized her cooperation in the inevitable seduction, while preferable, was no longer required.

“Nature, red in tooth and claw,” I hummed, kicking my insane chickens away from my ankles. Strictly for their own good - they couldn’t peck their way through my steel-reinforced galoshes, but the full weight of a boot on a bird’s back would do some serious damage. And that would be a shame, after all the work I’d put into the clockwork and weapons systems.

After ratcheting each bird up to full power, I stepped out of the coop and looked down at the quiet village below. “Soon,” I whispered, and laughed merrily.

My parents kept me cooped up in this hellhole for years. The only way to claw myself out, they said, was to get a full scholarship to an Ivy League school. So, I did what I was told and they can't say I didn't try. Then I discovered a way to make a lot of money and I could be out of here in a few years. Now I spend most of my time on my back and sometimes the requests are ratchet. But, hey, a girl's gotta' eat.

The starling sat on the telegraph wire six feet above the coop and watched as Hedley, dressed in his Sunday khaki pants and flak jacket, opened the passenger door to the truck. He placed the box containing the ratchet, wire, screws and hammer on the seat. Its swoop was silent but Hedley felt the bird’s wing brush the back of his hair in the split second before the claws dug into his neck. The full force of the talons severed the carotid artery instantly and he slumped to the icy ground. The bird sat on the coop, eyeing the hinge.

I looked down at the body. I was scared at what I had done -- at what I'd been capable of doing. Ratchets weren't meant to be used that way. But he'd kept me cooped up in that room too long, clawed at me one time too many. I'd figured I'd pay him back in kind. Still, as I looked in the mirror, I could only see a murderer staring back at me.

But the next day all the world would see as I stepped onto the field was just another fullback.

"Rachel, what are you doing?" the Fat man said."Consider her coopted," I said pushing her fully into the room, the gun now pointing at him."A robbery?" he scoffed."Claw back," I corrected. "You took Their cash, but did not deliver. Open!" I nodded at the safe.He shrugged. I pointed the gun at the girl."Shoot her and alert security.""Bastard!" she screamed, pulled the painting off the wall, breaking the ratchet, spun the combination, and opened the safe. She threw plastic packed bills on the table."Repayment in full," I agreed.We escaped - together - through the window.

Now the whole thing’s strictly tourist. Back when it started, we filed claws razor-sharp and ratcheted-up birds with chili pepper and cocaine. Didn’t have fancy hen houses back then, either. Our coops were flat bed trucks full of cages. Called it death row. Lost some birds to the sun—people too, but the sun didn’t kill them. Hell, guns and drugs and booze were everywhere. Surprised more didn’t die.

Won’t find any of that now. God damned shame if you ask me. God damned shame.

Coop sat in the mud and wiped at the blood on his leg. He had been in worse situations, and was fully aware that this was survivable. He took off his belt and wrapped it around his thigh above the broken flesh where bone had escaped. He ratcheted it down, ignoring the pain, ignoring the lifeless woman face down in the runoff, ignoring the constant rain and the idea that they were still chasing him somewhere up there. He secured the belt and began the painful crawl back up the other side, away from pursuit, away from death.

The Fabulous Blog Readers

Search This Blog

Chum Bucket! (click Gossamer for info)

The 411

I'm a literary agent in NYC. I specialize in crime fiction and narrative non-fiction (history and biography.) I'll be glad to receive a query letter from you; guidelines to help you decide if I'm looking for what you write are below.
There are several posts labelled "query pitfalls" and "annoy me" that may help you avoid some common mistakes when querying.